


not for your sake but for mine

by thesilverarrow



Category: Vampire Diaries (TV)
Genre: Episode Related, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-15
Updated: 2013-10-15
Packaged: 2017-12-29 13:16:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,896
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1005870
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thesilverarrow/pseuds/thesilverarrow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>It's well past 2:30 in the morning when she climbs in through his window.</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	not for your sake but for mine

**Author's Note:**

> Set just after "The New Deal" (3.10).
> 
> Please to be ignoring any inconsistencies about the Salvatore Manse.

It's well past 2:30 in the morning when she climbs in through his window. Her hands are raw from the tree bark and her arms are going to complain tomorrow, but it's worth it to hear the surprise in his voice, even if it's covered in its usual layer of desperate nonchalance.

"You have a key," he says, startling her, despite the fact that she's the one doing the sneaking. "Or did Stefan ask for it back when you two stopped going steady?"

"Hello to you, too."

Damon's sitting in an old easy chair in the corner of the room, holding a book. He lets a smile slip through before he frowns and says, "Seriously, what's with the nocturnal acrobatics? I'm not keen on scraping you up off the back patio."

"You do this all the time."

"And, all the time, I'm a vampire."

"Well, whatever. I wanted to see what the fuss is about."

"And?"

"Now I know that a window entrance gives you time to observe things. For instance, I know you move your lips when you read."

"Just the dialogue. More fun to hear it out loud."

"What are you reading?"

"Dostoyevsky," he replies. "Which is actually no fun no matter what you do with it."

"Can't be any worse than Dickens."

"Almost nothing's worse than Dickens." He glances at the clock on the wall. "What are you doing out in the middle of the night?"

"I couldn't sleep."

"Join the club."

"I wanted to take a walk."

"So you decided to wander around Mystic Falls all by your lonesome, with Klaus and his hybrid army roaming the streets, looking for a Salvatore to torture?"

"One, I'm not a Salvatore. Two, Klaus wouldn't hurt the Doppelganger, even to torture a Salvatore. And three, I came by car. But you already know that."

"Yeah, I heard you. Which is the only reason I haven't gotten off my ass to properly chastise you."

In the moonlight, she thinks she sees a hint of a smirk, but it might just be that she expects it.

"Look, I wanted to take a walk, but I didn't want to be reckless, so I came to find…someone to walk with."

It sounds so stupid when she says it -- no, scratch that, it _is_ stupid -- but to his credit, he just does what he does best: rolls his eyes and loads his voice with sarcasm.

"If you wanted a vampire bodyguard, you could've gone creeping into Caroline's bedroom."

"And you could've stopped being difficult already. You said things were going to be okay. When the sun comes up again, maybe they will be. Or at least I'll be able to pretend a little better. Right now, not so much. Distract me."

"At three a.m.?" he asks, frowning.

But he's already getting up, leaving his book open and face down on the arm of the chair. Once his profile is exposed in the moonlight, she sees that he's wearing his very serious face, the one he's been wearing too much since Stefan…

"We can go anywhere you want," she offers, not sure where the words come from. Apparently, she's feeling just as reckless as she just swore she wasn't.

He's pulling on his boots, and as he shrugs on his leather jacket and motions her toward the door, he says, "This is your walk, honey. I'm just the chaperone."

She snorts at that. He needs a chaperone. With her. Or she does. Or something.

"The town square?" she says, not looking him in the eyes.

But his gaze, like always, is drifting over her, fond and protective. His hands, though, are shoved resolutely in his pockets, so that he doesn't touch her as he says:

"Lead the way."

*

She'd imagined the empty streets would echo with their footsteps, but in reality there's still life tripping and meandering through their small town. The far-off shriek of people coming out of the bar. The occasional passing car, tires swishing over the pavement. The October wind stripping the trees of their leaves. 

The sound of her own heartbeat roaring in her ears.

It occurs to her that he can hear it. It might be mortifying if it wasn't Damon. There haven't been any real secrets between them for a while now, even if there's been a lot left unsaid. Or at least there was.

"So," she says, letting out a long, slow breath.

He sighs, then he holds up a hand to stop her. "Elena, you've already said what you wanted to say about what happened the other night. I get it."

"How do you know what I—"

"Because I know you. And because this is the particular look you get on your face when you disapprove of yourself."

At that, she lets out a short bark of a laugh.

She asks him, "Are you sorry you kissed me?"

He keeps his eyes on the moonlit horizon. She wonders what he sees there in the dark, just like she wonders what he sees when he looks at her. A naïve child. A weak human. Echoes of the woman that never loved him. What was it he'd said? Oh, yeah: his brother's girl. 

"I told you I wasn't," he replies. "Before I even did it, as I recall."

"Well, I'm not sorry either."

"No?"

"Well, at least not for the reasons you think."

"Okay," he says with a nod.

She waits for half a block or so for him to talk, or at least for him to get some look on his face she can interpret, but there's nothing. And it's not a tortured, repressed nothing, just an easy blankness, like he's already put the conversation out of his mind and is just enjoying the walk. It's kind of infuriating.

"You're just going to let that lie?"

"What do you want me to say, Elena? In a century and a half, I still haven't learned how to have these bullshit conversations with women, the ones that aren't conversations so much as elaborate productions where I’m expected to know what's written on some little script you've got written up in your head. Save us both the trouble: just give me my line."

"Seriously. _You_ can't bullshit a woman? Whatever. Look, have you ever known me, personally, to play games with you? On purpose, I mean."

"No. But I've also not known you to crash my bedroom in the middle of the night." He stops in the middle of the sidewalk. "What's going on in there?" he says, gingerly tapping a finger against her temple.

"I wanted to explain something, not necessarily for your sake but for mine."

"Alright," he says, then he holds out his hand. With less hesitation than she would've showed just six months ago, she takes it, clasping it without tangling their fingers together, and they continue their walk. 

"You were reading in the dark before," she says.

"Yes?"

"You and Stefan, Caroline -- you vampires can do amazing things. You could be anywhere, do anything, yet you're here, tied down to Mystic Falls. To me."

He raises his eyebrows but doesn't reply.

She goes on: "I've accepted that. I must…contribute something to your life. I mean, even Stefan hasn't left yet, not really."

"Elena, it's -- "

"Okay, so that's not the point. What I'm trying to say: I've lost a lot of people I've depended on. My parents. Jenna." It takes a moment before she can add, "Your brother." 

She's not all that surprised to find tears pricking at her eyes, but it still catches her off guard. She forces her voice to steady before she says, "I can't lose you, not even a little. I won't even risk it. Maybe it won't always be this way, but for now, it has to be."

"Okay."

"Okay?"

"Will you ever give up on Stefan?"

"Damon, what does—"

"I'm not hitting you with some jealous crap here. Would you ever stop hoping Stefan will turn his emotions back on? No. That's not who you are. Well, I've got all the time in the world to show you who I am."

He doesn't sound emotional; he sounds like he's thought this through, long and hard. That's what breaks her heart, and that's why she pulls him to a stop.

"You think I don't know you?" she says as she comes around to face him. "Don't be a moron."

At that, he smiles, no hint of sarcasm or gamesmanship. His long, cool fingers lift her chin, then his thumb ghosts over her lips. She has to suppress a shiver.

He's dropped his hand again before she can react, and he's already moving past her and down the street, without her hand in his.

The street is quiet now, nothing but the sound of leaves skittering across the sidewalk. Even her heart has slowed to normal. There was a time when she would've been nervous being left alone with him. Now, alone is what they are.

"You're the moron, by the way," he says, breaking up the comfortable silence.

"Oh."

"When I came back to Mystic Falls, I wasn't keen on doing the whole family thing. Obviously, I've revised my opinion on that subject."

"Even with Stefan…?"

"Even with Stefan. I know what it's like to lose people. Hurts like a bitch. But, see, no matter how much it hurts -- and I know you know this -- you don't give up on your family. Even if that means letting them go." 

He's talking about Jeremy, for her sake, but she knows his thoughts are never all that far from Stefan, no more than hers are.

She watches his face release itself from a contemplative frown and bloom into a so-casual-it's-obviously-not smile. "Luckily for me, right here is where I need to be," he says. "You're stuck with me, babe."

"I can live with that."

"Good," he says, nodding.

*

When they get back to the house, she heads straight for her car.

"Don't be an idiot."

"Damon," she says, although she doesn't even have the energy for a weary sigh. 

"There's a guest bed. You know this."

"There's also a serious disregard for heat in this drafty old house. You know this, because I've told you. On several occasions."

"I'll build you a fire. I mean, you'll have to light it and all, but I'll set you up."

"There's no fireplace in that bedroom."

"Then, unless you want me to dig up one of those old-fashioned Victorian bed warmers, these stupid coal pans on sticks, you'll sleep on the couch."

"What if I can't sleep?"

"Then come wake me for the sunrise."

"Yeah?"

He just nods and points at the couch. He's walking out of the room when he adds, "Of course, I could always read you some Dostoyevsky. That'd put you right out."

"No thanks."

When he returns, he's got her favorite old wool blanket and an extra pillow. On top of them is a well-worn copy of _Crime and Punishment_ , which he sets aside as he kneels in front of the fireplace and begins arranging logs. 

Laying out the blanket over her legs, she says, "You going to stay down here, be all creepy and watch me sleep?"

He shrugs. "It's better than being alone upstairs with a dead Russian."

And better, she thinks, than being home alone in an empty house. Complicated, but better.


End file.
